Chaz Royalâs ten-year anniversary

In 2002, Canadian Mark Henderson hit upon a new name and a new business when he began producing burlesque shows as Chaz Royal. He’s been one of the international scene’s leading showmakers ever since, with events ranging from London Burlesque Week to this year’s Edinburgh run of ‘Sexy Circus Sideshow’. Ahead of his ten-year anniversary shows at Bush Hall, Ben Walters asked Chaz to plunder his scrapbook for some key moments in his journey…

Flaming cheek, 2011

‘Within the new LBW format, I started to experiment more and dedicated a full night to the underbelly of the scene, calling it Twisted Cabaret. It turned out to be popular enough to become a regular fixture.

‘One of the most unlikely characters to emerge was Big Chief Random Chaos. The crowd certainly weren’t expecting him to light his mohawk in flames and extinguish the fire sticks on his ass.’